On the morning of October 31, 1984, when the staccato of sten gun fire interrupted the serenity in the gulmohar-mahogany clad compound of a pristine white bungalow on New Delhi’s Safdarjung Road, it marked the biggest turning point in the life of one Antonia Edvige Albina Maino, whose primary job every morning was to ensure a seamless passage for her mother-in-law from the inner recesses of her residence to her office next door at No 1 Akbar Road.
In joint families across India, there were — and there still are — numerous instances of the daughter-in-law playing second-fiddle to an authoritative mother-in-law who runs the family business and is indeed the matriarch whose writ is followed without a question.
But that all-too-familiar world of an almost archetypal Indian paradigm becomes so immensely noteworthy when one is told that this Antonia Maino is better known as Sonia Gandhi and the mother-in-law happens to be Indira Gandhi — the most authoritative premier the country has ever had.
On that fateful last day of October, three decades back, the television crew of British filmmaker Peter Ustinov was waiting to shoot a few minutes of footage on the prime minister of the world’s largest democracy and Sonia was to make sure Indira reached office at the designated time. An internal road connected the two bungalows at Safdarjung Road and Akbar Road.
But as the two personal bodyguards pumped bullets from their automatic weapons into a stunned Indira, Sonia mistook the gunfire for some Diwali-leftover crackers. But the commotion that followed on the lawns saw a curious Sonia rushing out seconds later. That was almost 31 years ago ... and till date, Sonia Gandhi, wife of former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi and mother of Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Vadra, hasn’t been able to “get back” home!
Sonia and Rajiv fell in love during their college days at Cambridge in 1965. Sonia, born to Stefano and Paula Maino at a place called Vicenza in Italy on December 9, 1946, was studying English at Bell Educational Trust’s language school in Cambridge in 1964, while Rajiv was a student of Trinity College, Cambridge University. The duo was married according to Hindu rituals and by the time Sonia moved into the Gandhi household in New Delhi, she took to the role of a “bahu” (daughter-in-law) like a fish takes to water — her Italian roots not proving to be a spoiler in any sense whatsoever. No wonder she had once said: “It was through the private world of family that the public world of politics came alive for me.”
Post-marriage, Rajiv and Sonia played the perfect couple, without letting the trappings of the Gandhi family bother them in any way — Rajiv busy with his job as a commercial pilot and Sonia with her responsibilities of a homemaker. It was Indira and her elder son Sanjay who managed government and party affairs, respectively, allowing Rajiv-Sonia to lead a life of their own.
The print media would even capture the couple enjoying ice-cream cones as they went for a stroll in the vicinity of India Gate on a quiet Sunday afternoon. Life indeed was a stroll!
But as Sanjay’s aircraft came crashing down in the afternoon of June 23, 1980, it marked a major turning point in Sonia’s life. With Rajiv inducted into the Congress party to strengthen his mother’s hand, Sonia too was not left behind in the sense that the cesspool of politics that the couple had so assiduously avoided for so long suddenly found them knee-deep in the turbid water in one fell swoop of fate.
Indira’s subsequent ego clash with Sanjay’s widow Maneka saw the latter chucked out of the Gandhi household. With that, the keys to Indira’s “kitchen cabinet”, literally, were passed on to Sonia for good. If that luncheon date with Rajiv at Cambridge’s Varsity Restaurant saw Sonia make a giant leap in her personal life, then Sanjay’s death saw Sonia emerge as the de facto No 2 within the Gandhi household.
And from thereon, she never looked back.
Within four years of Sanjay’s death, when Indira was assassinated by her bodyguards, Sonia literally took charge of the Gandhi family. Though Rajiv was the prime minister, Sonia fiercely guarded her privacy and that of the children.
Then came Rajiv’s assassination in 1991 and the Congress party’s departure from the Gandhi surname was the only logical conclusion since Sonia ignored fervent calls from party workers to be the party chief. However, after the 1996 rout in the Lok Sabha elections, Sonia finally decided to take the plunge and became a primary member of the party in 1997. She was elected party president the following year and happens to be the longest-serving member in that role in the history of the Indian National Congress.
After Congress won the 2004 general elections, there was an incredible clamour within the party for her to be the prime minister. But citing her foreign origin, opposition Bharatiya Janata Party launched a scathing personal attack on Sonia, with Sushma Swaraj even threatening to tonsure her head if Sonia became the prime minister.
As India soaked up every bit of that soap opera, Sonia nominated Dr Manmohan Singh as the premier — undoubtedly, the biggest master stroke of her career. At once, the BJP campaign of vitriol was neutralised for good and the seat of the prime minister could also be kept warm until Rahul matured.
However, Sonia hit the biggest stumbling block of her career with son Rahul. His inability to connect with the masses, his lack of leadership inside and outside parliament, his sudden disappearance before a crucial parliamentary session have all put paid to Sonia’s grand plan. Reports of her failing health and a hush-hush trip to New York in 2013 to reportedly undergo surgery at a cancer hospital have only added fuel to the rumour mills.
Yet, there is no denying the fact that Sonia is perhaps the most interesting case study in the entire gamut of Indian politics. From getting used to life in India, to the untimely death of her husband, to seeing the Congress slip to its lowest-ever tally in the Lok Sabha, Sonia has endured not just storms but tornadoes in her personal life and political career, but never for once has anyone seen her lower her guard.
Even when the fires of the Bofors scandal threatened to engulf her husband for his alleged links with Italian businessman Ottavio Quattrocchi, Sonia held her own. She has fiercely guarded her privacy through the many upheavals in her private and personal life.
The daughter-in-law who had rushed out to see Indira lying in a pool of blood has perhaps been longing to be back “home” once and for all. But in the meanwhile, the warped world that she has spun around her has only drawn her away and away from that cherished “homecoming”.
The last word on Sonia the enigma shall never be heard!
What she said:
“An economy growing at 7 per cent per year, can and must find the resources to improve the lives of its millions of poor.”
“It was through the private world of family that the public world of politics came alive for me: Living in intimate proximity with people for whom larger questions of ideology and belief, as well as issues relating to politics and governance, were vivid daily realities.”
“I do not consider myself a foreign national because I have always thought of myself as an Indian.”
This column aims to profile personalities who made the news once but have now faded from the spotlight.
